We arrived at the restaurant and were given a table inside.
She sat across from me and looked at her menu, her makeup making her eyes stand out, her dress tight and sexy on her nice figure. Her brown hair was pulled to one side, and without realizing it, she bit her bottom lip as she tried to decipher the menu.
I stared at her instead of the selections.
She didn’t notice. “Normally, I use Google translate for this, but I don’t have a phone.” She raised her chin and looked at me. “Any recommendations?”
“What are you in the mood for? There’s beef cannelloni, citrus avocado with salmon, seafood pasta, roasted lamb, margherita pizza, steak and fries…”
“Ooh…that’s a good list.” She looked at the menu again even though she couldn’t read it. “What are you getting?”
“Cannelloni.” I set the menu at the edge of the table.
“I don’t know if I want the pizza or the steak…”
“What if you get the steak and take the pizza home?”
“Can I do that?” She looked over her menu again, her eyebrows raised.
“Yes.” A smile fought through my restraints and came on to my lips.
Her eyes softened when she saw it, like that was one of the things in the world that made her happy…when I was happy. “You’re gonna get a blow job when we get back to the apartment.” She set the menu at the edge of the table.
My smile widened. “We should go out to dinner more often.”
I sat against the headboard and watched her move up and down slowly, taking my dick completely before she used her powerful thighs to raise herself once again. Her tits were in front of me, firm and sexy, and I just sat there and watched this incredible woman enjoy me like I was the only man in the world she wanted to be with.
My hands moved to her tits, and I squeezed them, listening to her breathe hard from both pleasure and exertion. She would close her eyes and let her lips part, releasing a gasp when my dick hit her in the perfect spot. I watched her with fascination, deep in the moment but also outside of it, watching this gorgeous woman make love to me in the sexiest way. She rolled her hips slowly, dragged her hands down my hard chest, cupped my face and kissed me with trembling lips. “Magnus.” With her lips pressed to mine, she said my name.
My hands went to her ass and guided her up and down, knowing she was close. So was I. “Ma petite amie…” My face moved into her neck, and I felt my dick harden even more, knowing she was right at the edge.
She clawed my shoulders as she came, releasing a loud gasp followed by several more. “Yes…”
My arms wrapped around her waist, and I finished with her, both of us moaning and writhing as we hit ecstasy at the same time. My arms squeezed her harder than I should, but she never protested against the tightness, like she could handle a man’s crushing embrace, even liked it.
As the crescendo of our passion faded, my hold slackened and my arms slid across her back as I pulled away, looking into her watery eyes and seeing the passion burn her all the way through. Just like always.
She moved into me and placed a final kiss on my lips before she got off me and lay in the spot beside me, her naked body coated in sweat, her hair in disarray. She closed her eyes and lay on top of the sheets.
I held my position and looked at her, watched her recover from the exertion because she was the one who’d done all the work for the last forty-five minutes. My hand went to her arm, and I gently grazed my fingers across it, feeling the dampness of her sticky skin.
Then she got out of bed, pulled on my t-shirt, and walked out of the room.
My head turned as my eyes followed her.
Her footsteps sounded on the stairs and then disappeared.
I grabbed my glass of water and took a drink.
When she came back, the pizza box was in her hand.
My eyebrows rose, and a gentle smile moved on to my lips.
She got back into the bed beside me and opened the top to grab a slice.
I just watched her.
“What?” She chewed a bite as she held the pizza box in her lap, her eyes on the contents of the box.
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You’ve never seen a woman eat pizza after sex?”
“No.”
She opened the lid and turned the box toward me. “Want some?”
I shook my head.
“Come on, it’s amazing.”
I ate three meals a day and never snacked in between. I also avoided desserts because I didn’t have a sweet tooth. In general, I wasn’t much of an eater. I preferred to drink copious amounts of wine and scotch instead.
She took another bite and leaned against the headboard, her sexy legs poking out from underneath her shirt. “I want to eat as much of this good stuff as I can before we go back.” She took another bite and ate closer to the crust.
When we stayed in Paris, it was easy to fall into this dreamlike reality, enjoying the city and each other. Sometimes I forgot about the camp altogether…until the departure date drew near. The feud with Alix had been resolved, or at least it seemed, so Raven wouldn’t be in danger. But bringing her to that miserable place was getting more and more difficult.
She bit the crust in half as she watched me. “What?”
I shifted my gaze to hers, unsure what she referred to.
“You disappeared.”
My eyes looked away again, staring at my dark bedroom and the shadows in the corners. “Nothing.”
Twenty-Six
Back to the Beginning
I drove down the street lined with apartments in one of the upscale neighborhoods of Paris. People walked down the sidewalk with their dogs on leashes, their hands holding mugs of coffee. Shopping bags were in their hands, baguettes sticking out alongside the necks of wine bottles. It was still the quiet neighborhood I remembered.
When I recognized the house, I pulled over and parked in front of it.
Raven turned to look out my window, knowing we’d stopped for an important reason. We were on our way back to the camp, but I’d decided to take a detour. She held her silence and watched me look out the window.
I’d only come back to that house once. The city had repossessed it and sold it to pay off some of my father’s debts. I’d watched the new family move inside—they’d gotten it at a cheap price because of the murders that had taken place.
There was a new coat of paint on the outside, but it otherwise looked the same.
Raven didn’t ask any questions, picking up on my mood and my stare. “That’s where you grew up.”
I kept my gaze on the entrance, seeing the front door open and a teenage boy take the steps to the bottom. He turned right and continued on his way, oblivious to the two of us staring at him intently.
“Does it look different?”
I shook my head. “There’s a new coat of paint on the exterior, but…” I remembered the Christmas tree that used to be in the front window every year. We would decorate it with ornaments we’d kept since childhood. The house would be filled with the roast turkey my mom would cook for hours, starting right in the morning. I remembered our family vacations to Italy and Switzerland. My childhood had been wonderful, with two loving parents and siblings I’d never forgotten. Money had ruined us, not because we’d lost it, but because my father thought it was more important than the most priceless thing he had—us. My brother seemed to have fallen victim to the same illness, chasing wealth like it was the answer to all his problems, like it would somehow prove something to our dead father, who’d been dumped in the ocean.